Hi Guys, sorry i have been so quiet, the last month and a half has been rather hectic. i have loads to tell you, so keep posted, ill be putting some stories up! hope you enjoy the read.

tying the donkey to a tree so the lions don't pull it away

“Its at night, its cold, you have to be as quiet as you can for the most part, it cold, its late, its load and then you just sit and wait.... We’ll be lucky if we get one lion to collar... And did I mention its cold.” Thats what I was told before we left on our little journey into the wilderness of GNP (Gonarezhou National Park) to collar a lion or two. But I had a good feeling about this trip, yes I did. We decided to start down in Mabalauta where we knew there was a pride as they had been spotted once or twice before. But before you actually go out to try dart and collar a lion there are some things that need to be done.... Like organizing a bait! A donkey at that matter. My first job was to go to the community just outside the park and barter for a donkey, I then had to organize this poor little donkey to be shot. Not my favorite part, I said a little prayer for the donkey, shame man. So now I have the donkey and we are ready to go find a good place to put it. Off we go.... Wala! Yip Wala! There they are in just about the same spot I saw them the first time in Mabalauta in March. Panic! Need to get darts ready, man they took us off guard. Its cool Rosemary is a champ at this kind of thing, wips up a dart and off we go to find them again..... Gone! Nooooo, its cool we have a donkey! We find a good place and set up the bait. We make a little boma looking structure to keep the lions on one side of the donkey (helps with darting), I might add its made from thorns! And yes we made it, got some serious ouches outta it. Now without going into too much detail all I can say is when you cut open a very dead bloated donkey dont breath in for a little while! Im serious. Its just a tiny bit stinky. But you gotta get right in there, pulling the matumbos ( insides) out so the lions can smell the blood, all very dirty and I still loved it.

Me taking measurements of our one collared lioness

When doing an exercise like this placement of the car is important as is the placements of the speakers. Oh wait I havent told you about the speakers. Speakers are used to call the lions to the bait... How... You play, on repeat, the sound of a dying buffalo! Worst sound ever! The first night I sat in the back of the pickup, yes it had no canopy, listening to this god awful sound of a dying buffalo. Rosemary earlier had told me how at time the lions would come to the car first as that is where the sound was before realizing that there was “free food” not far away. Im thinking to myself... I reek like dead donkey and the lions are gonna come to the car first! What! Well time passes, Im cold my ears are bleeding form the noise and then THERE! There they are 6 of ‘em, yip they where not 10m away form the car..... I wont lie I just about jumped into poor Rubens lap! Its cool they are going to the bait. Rosemary hops in the back, I in the front. Spot light goes on.. Rosemary shoots and she gets a hit! Yip Shes pretty awesome like that! We wait a little while for the drug to work then we drive to the bait, put the lion on the tailgate, and go back to our spot.. Remember we have one lion but there are still 5 out there. So now we gotta do what we gotta do and keep watch for the others too. We call in for some backup... Not really I’ve just always wanted to say that :-), Dr. F wants to do some bTB testing so the other vehicle comes to the same spot and darts another 3 lion. We put a GPS collar on the female we darted, do our measurements, take blood.... mission accomplished, and what a rush! It happens all so quickie and efficiently. Yeah team.

a beautiful male lion.

To do the bBt testing you gotta try and recapture the same lions, so three days later off we go with another donkey and another posse, remember we know where the lions are now... We have collars on two of em :-). We get everything sorted and Imo not joking the moment Rosemary said are we ready.... We hear.. Wait for it... A dyeing buffalo! A real one, right where we know the collars signal is coming form! Nooooooooo! Not good for us, that mean they’re not going to come to our donkey! Not to admit defeat, we decide to try and oh my golly gosh Im so glad we did. Firstly a lovely big lioness pitches up, we dart her and put a VHF collar on and then! A huge, black maned male lion comes strolling in! It is honestly the airiest feeling you can feel. We heard him first.. Roaring in the distance so we stopped the “music” and then.. Oh... Man... You just hear him... His rumble, his steps, his presence... Heart stopping really. Then you see him, WOW, absolutely incredible, I honestly havent seen a male like that in the wild ever actually. It makes me think how, how on earth do hunters want to shoot something that is so magnificent, really king of the wild. We just watched for a while, taking in such a privileged experience.

Last lioness darted to treat an injury

We have one GPS collar left and we are hoping to get a lion closer to Chapping Pools (north of the Park) we have heard them in the hill before, but heaven knows where they are. Off we go to try, maybe random luck, maybe serious skill, I dont know but we just choose any old spot put our bait up, make our boma, call, sit, and wait. Nothing.. Boo. We decide to sit in silence for a Lwhile, fall asleep material, we are exhausted. And then... Running coming from behind us! Closer and closer, right past us. Rosemary gets up from her half rested half alert state and mutters Heather spotlight, bloody hyenas! Ohhhh no, to every ones amazement.. Two huge beautiful lionesses. We cant believe it, yeah for us. We darted the one but then realized that the other lioness was injured so we darted her too. We put the collar on the one and gave the injured lioness a shot of penicillin and put some antiseptic mooti ( ointment) on the wound. 11 lion seen, 6 darted and 3 collared.... Mission successful! Now dont let this fool you to think there are plenty of lion in the Park, we had a rough idea of where they where, but this park is close to 5000km2 and after the 2010 call up survey it was found that there are only 40-45 lion in the whole Park. I feel privileged to have been able to be part of this team, now we will be able to monitor the lions with in these prides and find out where and what they are doing. What and experience!

After some more fundraising we (AWCF) hope to collar some more lions to enable us to monitor as many lions within the park as possible. If you would be interested or know of anyone who would be able to help us buy more collars (GPS collars- $2200, VHF- $370 each) please contact me directly or visit our websight at www.africanwildlifeconservationfund.org/ - large carnivore monitoring. Any little bit helps.

Thanks and I hope you enjoyed reading this.Keep posted... Rhino transmitter implant story to followcheers for nowHeather

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Hi there, Heather here, currently i am in ZIMBABWE, my home country. I am working on a Lion Conservation Project in Conarezhou National Park. Please visit the GNP Predator Project page and Fundraising page to help us save the Lions in the Park. I hope you enjoy my blogs